He changed his behavior before them and pretended to be insane in their hands, and scribbled on the doors of the gate, and let his spittle fall down on his beard.
ExplanationCommentary
Verse 13. Countenance. Hebrew “sentiment, ( Calmet.) or, behaviour.” Bible.—Chal. “reason.” He no longer acted as a prudent man, but like a fool.—Down; not fainting, ( Calmet.) but like one in an epileptic fit. Bible.—Hebrew “he feigned himself mad.” Chal. “stupid.”—Stumbled. Hebrew “wrote, or made figures upon.” Septuagint “beat the drum upon the gates of the city, and he was carried about, or acted the fool, in his hands, (παρεφερετο εν ταις χερσιν, αυτου: Amama would have, αυτων, their) and he fell against the doors of the gate,” and so forth They seem to give a double translation. Saint Augustine says, “we cannot understand how David could be carried in his own hands. But we understand how it was verified in Christ. For Christ was carried in his own hands at his last supper, when he gave, or commending, his own body, he said, This, and so forth for he then carried his own body in his own hands.” In Ps. xxxiii. conc. i.) Ferebat enim illud corpus in manibus suis. Amama may laugh at Saint Augustine’s ignorance of Hebrew, but the holy doctor was at least a sincere Catholic. Bible.—Beard. We find some wretched objects doing the same. Mar. 9:17. The spittle was deemed infectious. Et illic isti qui sputatur, morbus interdum venit. Plautus in Captivis.